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Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

The stats do go against what you think, but then again, maybe not? LeBron and Wade usually stayed on the floor against our bench, so the starters would hold serve and even slightly win their matchup, but then our bench came in and got man-handled by LeBron and/or Wade, who each averaged 40+ mins the entire series. It did always seem that it was those small windows where LeBron vs our bench or Wade vs our bench was where they'd go on those huge runs against us until our starting unit got back in.

Those stats may not be a great indicator either, because of the momentum of the series. Indiana completely took it to them for the first three games, and then mostly fell apart in the final 3. Not a very good indicator of where things were won and lost. I'd bet the starters +/- was considerably lower in the last 3 games.

I still stand by the theory that in the playoffs, you don't lean on your bench near as much, and it's mostly won starters vs starters. I have a hard time believing Miami's bench outscored our bench by 200+ points straight-up in that series as indicated by that link. Or, to put it another way, I have a hard time believing Miami's bench is their strength and not LeBron James and DWade. I have to believe it was Miami's starters vs our bench at least partially responsible for those numbers. It seemed like LeBron never sat down.

Last edited by Kid Minneapolis; 07-17-2012 at 12:51 PM.

There are two types of quarterbacks in the league: Those whom over time, the league figures out ... and those who figure out the league.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Our starters got mostly owned in the last three when Miami solved us. PG was the only guy to stand his ground.

One other thing to consider --- Game 5 when we got our asses handed to us by 33 --- Vogel took the starters out and let the bench get ate alive, further making that +/- skewed. Only one Indy starter broached 30 minutes played in that game.

"Stats: They look great when you shape them in a particular way that proves your point."

Last edited by Kid Minneapolis; 07-17-2012 at 12:53 PM.

There are two types of quarterbacks in the league: Those whom over time, the league figures out ... and those who figure out the league.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Our starters got mostly owned in the last three when Miami solved us. PG was the only guy to stand his ground.

One other thing to consider --- Game 5 when we got our asses handed to us by 33 --- Vogel took the starters out and let the bench get ate alive, further making that +/- skewed. Only one Indy starter broached 30 minutes played in that game.

"Stats: They look great when you shape them in a particular way that proves your point."

I would not say owned, Hill was only -1 and Roy was -4, the others were not ridiculously bad but as I said previously, I think a lot had to do with Barbosa, when he was in the game, he offered nothing on offense and defense, and hurt all of the guys who were playing with him int he +/- category.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Okay owned is strong, but they lost their match-ups... either way, not a winning formula.

Miami was just a whole lot better team than the Pacers and this next year, they are going to be a whole lot better team again. Indiana is built for the regular season where they like to use their bench to rest starters. However, when the playoffs come along and the stars are playing 40+ minutes per game, the Pacers are quickly left in the dust. This year will be no different and the Pacers may move back a bit because both NY teams could move ahead of them along with Miami, Chicago and Boston.....

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Has anyone else thought it was bizarre that Vogel consistently played the entire second unit together? The difference between the +/- for the starters vs. the bench shows more about the problem with a platoon substitution pattern than it does about the players themselves. No team can expect to hold a lead with their 6-10 players against another team's starters. There's a reason every other NBA team staggers the substitutions so that 2-3 starters are always on the floor.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

I still stand by the theory that in the playoffs, you don't lean on your bench near as much, and it's mostly won starters vs starters. I have a hard time believing Miami's bench outscored our bench by 200+ points straight-up in that series as indicated by that link. Or, to put it another way, I have a hard time believing Miami's bench is their strength and not LeBron James and DWade. I have to believe it was Miami's starters vs our bench at least partially responsible for those numbers. It seemed like LeBron never sat down.

Exactly, if it was our bench vs miani's bench our bench probably would have won that match-up going away. The problem was it was our bench vs miami's starters. No bench in the NBA is going to be able to compete against a playoff team's starters. That, along side with Barbosa's horrible play, is what lost this series. If the bench played fewer minutes and was more intertwined with the starters this team would have been able to overcome the bench's failures.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Those numbers aligned almost exactly with my thoughts weeks ago. I'm only surprised Roy's numbers aren't higher. I said in another thread that it was a layup drill when Roy sat.

I must say I have enjoyed the last year of sanity. The team is making smart moves. No, we are not blessed with superstar talent, but TPTB are doing the best they can with the assets available.

This is a very tangential question, but I've been seeing the acronym "TPTB" flying around quite a bit lately... What exactly does it stand for? Based on context, it obviously refers to the Pacers front office (or something like that), but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "TB" actually stands for. Thanks!

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

This is a very tangential question, but I've been seeing the acronym "TPTB" flying around quite a bit lately... What exactly does it stand for? Based on context, it obviously refers to the Pacers front office (or something like that), but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "TB" actually stands for. Thanks!

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

This is a very tangential question, but I've been seeing the acronym "TPTB" flying around quite a bit lately... What exactly does it stand for? Based on context, it obviously refers to the Pacers front office (or something like that), but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "TB" actually stands for. Thanks!

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

This is a very tangential question, but I've been seeing the acronym "TPTB" flying around quite a bit lately... What exactly does it stand for? Based on context, it obviously refers to the Pacers front office (or something like that), but I can't for the life of me figure out what the "TB" actually stands for. Thanks!

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

LeBron and Wade usually stayed on the floor against our bench, so the starters would hold serve and even slightly win their matchup, but then our bench came in and got man-handled by LeBron and/or Wade, who each averaged 40+ mins the entire series. It did always seem that it was those small windows where LeBron vs our bench or Wade vs our bench was where they'd go on those huge runs against us until our starting unit got back in.

Yep. What does the Miami +/- against the Pacers look like? I think their starters and our starters are probably both full of positive numbers, and that is only possible because our strategy was to play our bench against their all-world starters. Not going to editorialize any further.

Why do the things that we treasure most, slip away in time
Till to the music we grow deaf, to God's beauty blind
Why do the things that connect us slowly pull us apart?
Till we fall away in our own darkness, a stranger to our own hearts
And life itself, rushing over me
Life itself, the wind in black elms,
Life itself in your heart and in your eyes, I can't make it without you

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

The stats do go against what you think, but then again, maybe not? LeBron and Wade usually stayed on the floor against our bench, so the starters would hold serve and even slightly win their matchup, but then our bench came in and got man-handled by LeBron and/or Wade, who each averaged 40+ mins the entire series. It did always seem that it was those small windows where LeBron vs our bench or Wade vs our bench was where they'd go on those huge runs against us until our starting unit got back in.

Those stats may not be a great indicator either, because of the momentum of the series. Indiana completely took it to them for the first three games, and then mostly fell apart in the final 3. Not a very good indicator of where things were won and lost. I'd bet the starters +/- was considerably lower in the last 3 games.

I still stand by the theory that in the playoffs, you don't lean on your bench near as much, and it's mostly won starters vs starters. I have a hard time believing Miami's bench outscored our bench by 200+ points straight-up in that series as indicated by that link. Or, to put it another way, I have a hard time believing Miami's bench is their strength and not LeBron James and DWade. I have to believe it was Miami's starters vs our bench at least partially responsible for those numbers. It seemed like LeBron never sat down.

I had to log in to give a big thanks to this post, finally somebody figured it out, bravo.

Funny to see that the numbers don't help West but "is ok because he got to play with Tyler, Barbosa and DC so it affected his numbers" give me a break, people blaming our bench for the Pacers playoffs loss don't want to admit that we need better starters not a better bench, even SA had a deep bench but at the end of the day their starters were the ones that couldn't pull the win, hell Miami's bench if I'm not mistaken was one of the worse bench in the NBA but their numbers are good because Lebron and Dwade were playing 40+ minutes.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

The starters play with Hibbert. Hibbert stops penetration and forces mid range shots. Lou and Tyler don't. Maybe Mahinmi will have more of an impact.

Our bench wings are all pretty decent on defense, but with their own weaknesses. DJones is good on the ball but bad getting around screens. That's why he didn't play against Orlando, but got minutes against Miami. Barbosa blows on ball, but sticks with his man while getting screened.

Re: Have you seen the plus-minus from the Miami series?

Yep. What does the Miami +/- against the Pacers look like? I think their starters and our starters are probably both full of positive numbers, and that is only possible because our strategy was to play our bench against their all-world starters. Not going to editorialize any further.

Miami has LeBron at +44, Chalmers at +29, Battier at +28, Miller at +26, and Cole at +23. Wade is tied for 7th at +13. They only have 3 negative players, and the worst one of those was Bosh at -7 in obviously limited minutes.

So the Pacers had two players put up worse negative numbers than LeBron did positive (Barbosa at -70 and Collison at -65) despite playing less minutes combined than LeBron did. LeBron was 18 points better than the Pacers top positive figure (Hibbert at +26) while Miami's worst was 63 better than Barbosa.

The Pacers starters averaged 33.93 minutes per game in the series. LeBron averaged 42.15. Wade averaged 37.9. The next 3 Miami players in minutes (Chalmers, Battier, Anthony) averaged 29.89 minutes combined. Overall the Miami top 5 in minutes averaged 33.94 minutes per game in the series. So there's definitely an effect from the Big 2 playing more minutes than the Pacers starters, but if it is large enough to account for this very wide disparity is very debatable.

To further illustrate how strange it is to have such a wide disparity between starters and bench, I broadened the search out a little bit. There were 153 players to play 50+ minutes in the playoffs this year. The Pacers starters are 13th, 14th, 18th, 19th, and 22nd best on that list for total +/- (as you would expect, the winning teams take up the top spots. 6 Heat, 5 Thunder, 5 Pacers, 4 Spurs, and 2 Celtics take up the top 22 spots). The Pacers bench members? 105th, 120th, 134th, 140th, 143rd. Those teams that were mentioned with the Pacers at the top of the list? 0 Heat that low, 0 Thunder, 2 Spurs, and 3 Celtics.